I qualified as a nurse from the Mater Hospital, Dublin. A lifetime ago. I was eighteen when I began, a naive, green-as-grass young woman whose eyes were soon opened. Over the next three years, I was thrown into the deep end of ward nursing. Often, as second, or third-year nurses, we’d be left in charge of a ward of twenty sick patients, a massive responsibility.
We worked long hours with only one day off a week. As student nurses, we had 4 weeks of holidays a year – they could be given all together or split up. Once, a friend of mine had her 4 weeks at the end of her first year, followed by another 4 weeks at the start of her second year. Then she didn’t have holidays again until we qualified, almost two years later.
We daren’t complain. Once I did – and I can’t remember what it was about – and was told, ‘It’s not Butlin’s holiday camp you’re in, Miss Foley.’ I can still remember the dismissive words over forty years later!
What got us through the years with all its ups and downs, were the friendships we made, the ones that have lasted. Looking at these photos, takes me back, not to the hard, often backbreaking work, but to the camaraderie, the laughter, the things we got up to, the men we fell in love with. Us four – we grew up together.
I worked in operating theatres for a few years, then switched to care for the elderly, which I loved.
Of the four of us in these photos, I was the last to work as a nurse, finally giving up in 2018 when I got my first publishing contract.
They say you should write what you know. Most of the nurses I worked with over the years were decent, hard-working people – not the ideal characters for psychological thrillers, really – so meet Lissa McColl–
Lissa is a murderer – but is she a bad nurse? You’ll have to read The Nurse to find out!